Is rap journalism dead?
On Tuesday (Feb. 20), Nas and Freddie Gibbs producer Statik Selektah started a conversation with prominent journalists about the state of rap journalism on social media.
Directed at Sirius XM radio personality Sway Calloway, Selektah tweeted on X, “Watching rap journalism dissolve right in front of us isn’t fun. I studied it growing up as a kid. Hey, at least we got a few great radio shows left cc: @realsway @shade45.”
Statik invites conversation on Instagram with a tweet screenshot and caption, “Let’s talk about it”. Various noteworthy hip hop journalists would share their viewpoints.
Bostonian author Dart Adams kicked off the conversation in the producer’s comments with, “No one cares about facts, context, history and minutiae when it comes to Rap when you can just have dudes arguing, gossiping, spreading inaccuracies & airing old laundry instead. I focused on actual Rap journalism from 2005 to 2018 and now I’m fact-checking books & doing documentaries because I was broke as fuck being an actual journalist in this space. Corporations want PR agents & influencers, not people who’d tell the truth to their faces. I speak from experience.”
“I think it’s important to instill wisdom and knowledge into the younger generation as the OGs,” said Carl Lamarre, Billboard Deputy Director of Hip-Hop/R&B. “Will all of them listen? Of course not. But if we can try to provide the tools, wisdom and resources to educate, the real ones will emerge and continue to do the work. Also, it comes down to attention span. Sites aren’t offering thoughtful think pieces or in-depth features. The ones that do, people aren’t reading them anymore. Everything is microwaveable. People want something quick and fast and that’s a part of the problem too.”
Others plugged their respected hip-hop media outlet while Andreas Hale, an acclaimed music and sports journalist, shared that the industry has been dissolving since 2003. He tells Statik:
“Bruh, I’d LOVE to have this dialog because there are so many reasons that collapse on each other as to why the art of Hip Hop Journalism has been dying. I’ve been in this game since 2003 and have watched it deteriorate year over year.”
In the comments, Rob Markman, a well-known journalist and recording artist, said, “Sad to watch. Still good people doing good work out here, learning to adapt.”
After commenting on Instagram, Markman posted a video about Selektah’s tweet on X.
“I agree with him.” said Markman in the video “It isn’t fun, but I also wanna acknowledge that there are a lot of great people still doing great work in the journalism space. It’s not dead. We’re not at the funeral. There are people doing great work in the changing landscape. But there’s a couple of factors. I’m just gonna list these factors.”
He continued: “We need a way bigger forum with more voices to talk about this. But a bunch of factors at play here, technology and accessibility, everybody has a platform now. Dwindling advertising dollars in traditional media spaces. The fall of print, which happened so many years ago, shrinking editorial staffs. Journalists are important, writers are important, but so are editors, so are fact-checkers.”
After addressing the changes, Markman talked about media adapting a new format of reporting, he said:
“We got into this space where we were sacrificing accuracy for speed to publish. The biggest artists choosing mainstream looks instead of the hip-hop publications that covered them when nobody else would. The audience goes where the biggest artists go. Audience clicks, right? Where you put your clicks matter. The rise of the TMZ model. A lot of major publications adopted that.”
“And journalists and the business just failing to adapt. At the same time, this thing was never meant to stay the same. It is always changing.”
Hip-hop magazines like The Source, Rap Pages, and Word Up! lost their prestige with the arrival of the blog era in the early 2000s. Only XXL Magazine remains in print for hip-hop publications, and it has been reduced to a quarterly basis. Social media has replaced the blog era.
Hip-hop journalism and media journalism, in general, have been declining rapidly in recent years, with many outlets closing or being acquired, and mass layoffs being a common occurrence.
Last month, Forbes reported that Warner Music Group, which owns hip-hop media outlets Hip Hop DX and Uproxx, plans to lay off 600 employees and sell Uproxx to double down on “core business.” It was announced on Wednesday (Feb. 21) that Complex was sold to NWTRK for $108 million after being purchased by Buzzfeed for $300 million in 2021. The company will layoff 16% of Complex’s remaining staff in the acquisition.